Vermont goalie Conor Leland keeps an eye on the ball during the men's soccer game between the UMBC Retrievers and the Vermont Catamounts at Virtue Field. / BRIAN JENKINS, for the Free Press

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Free Press Staff Writer

12 career shutouts in 29 starts — eighth all-time at UVM 0.83 goals against average in 2013 5-foot-10

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The trip from Richmond to the University of Vermont is pretty much a straight shot. Three exits up I-89, past the box stores and the whale tails, about 20 minutes door-to-door.

It took Conor Leland, the America East’s reigning goalkeeper of the year, a little longer than that.

An undersized goalkeeper with outsized athleticism, Leland was never a first-team all-state selection at Mount Mansfield, overshadowed by the likes of Essex’s David Ramada and Burlington’s Amir Pasic. Early high school tragedies conspired to undermine his grades, which kept him from getting into UVM.

“My family wanted me to come here. I always came to the hockey games, soccer, basketball (games) growing up so I saw all the stars and looked up to those icons,” said Leland, now a senior. “I definitely wanted to come here and that goal, when I didn’t receive it, it hurt.”

Taking command between the posts for the Catamounts required a year at Franklin Pierce, a Division II school, three hours to the south. It was the first of two years spent waiting, biding his time, honing his skills — an unnerving existence for someone with his competitive fire.

“He had gotten to that point where he used his frustration in not playing and his disappointment to really push and train and build and continue to refine his abilities,” said Jesse Cormier, the UVM men’s soccer coach. “So when he got his opportunity he took off.

“I’ve seen that pattern in a lot of guys. It’s the guys that don’t use frustration and disappointment — it derails them, they stop training, they become discouraged — that don’t make it.

“Conor did the opposite. He used it to drive him.”

Losses and maturity

Disappointing as it is to sit the bench or get beat for a goal, life deals more punishing blows.

Conor Leland knew that well before he put on a UVM jersey.

As a high school freshman, his best friend died after being hit by a car in Florida, he said, an event that rocked his circle of friends.

“That was tough to take as a 13-, 14-year-old,” Leland said.

“And then the following year, my neighbor, who was basically a brother, he died in the war in Iraq,” he said, referring to Pfc. Adam Muller of Richmond, who was killed by an improvised explosive device during a patrol in 2007.

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The losses led to a dip in his grades as a freshman and sophomore, he said, something that cost him two years later when he had his sights set on playing soccer for the Catamounts.

“But when you apply for colleges they don’t see that, they just see the grades,” Leland said. “I had to use them to move forward, I couldn’t just live in the past like that.”

Phil Jacobs, the Mount Mansfield boys soccer coach since 1992, was convinced that everything would click for his three-year starter once his maturity began to match his athletic gifts.

“I always told him if he could commit himself 100 percent to be the best he could be, no one would be better,” Jacobs said. “I always felt like Conor was the best in the state."

Unable to get into UVM, the Cougars’ career shutout leader — also a four-year varsity basketball player — opted to follow a path blazed by former MMU and Vermont soccer player Connor O’Brien, using Franklin Pierce as a launching pad back to Burlington.

In New Hampshire, Leland improved his academic stock. He was understudy to the Ravens’ All-American goalkeeper Vinny Papageorgiou. He grew up.

He could go back to Vermont.

“The piece that needed to fall into place was the maturity and it did,” Cormier said.

“He matured and he came back with a competitive edge, really looking to make an impact on the program,” Cormier said.

Not the prototype

“Five-ten on a good day” is the height of the Catamounts’ starting goalkeeper, according to Conor Leland.

That’s not the listed height on the prototype for the position, but not every goalie can move like Leland, who confirmed Jacobs’ story that, even at 5-foot-10, he could dunk when he was in his basketball-playing prime.

That explosiveness, now measured in his ability to spring to each corner of the 24-foot goal frame to deny opponents, is a key to Leland’s acrobatic goalkeeping style and what sets him apart from past UVM backstops.

“He’s by far the best athlete, a tremendous jumper,” Cormier said. “We’ve been in the weight room and just watched him jump over people.

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“Literally, off of two feet, leap over a guy.”

And, more or less, that’s how he won the job as the Catamounts No. 1 keeper.

After his sophomore season, Leland started 2012 as the backup to Ramada, the 6-foot-4 Essex product. However, events during the 1-2 start to the season led the coaches to give Leland a chance in the next game against Oakland.

The season debut was a 1-0 loss, but he didn’t disappoint, giving coaches a sense of, “I can own this and I can do this and not only am I going to do this, I’m going to be outstanding,” Cormier said.

“I watch the highlights from that game a lot, just to see the energy level. I was catching everything, even coming off the line too much, I had so much energy,” Leland said. “Sitting those last two years you could tell I was just ready for that moment.”

In the 28 games since, Leland and the Catamounts are 15-6-7. His dozen shutouts rank him eighth in program history and, because he didn’t play at Franklin Pierce, he is eligible for a fourth season at UVM next year.

Before the Catamounts dropped games to Hartford and UMBC in the last two weeks, Leland was ninth in the nation in goals-against average and 10th in save percentage. After the losses, he was still 40th in goals against, second best in the conference.

“It’s pretty remarkable to see him go from a D-II school, decide he’s going to transfer into D-I, wait for his turn and when he gets his turn take advantage of it,” UVM captain Scott Kisling said. “He hasn’t really looked back. It’s pretty cool to see that and admire how he’s worked his way up on the team.”

'The ultimate competitor'

Leland maintains a vocal presence in the Catamounts’ net, organizing the defense as he reads the action up the field. There’s no hint of hesitance as he darts off his line, flying through the air to corral a cross or a corner kick.

“Away! Away! Away!” echoes across the field with a loose ball on the edge of the 6-yard box.

“Eyes! Eyes! Four, I need four!” are instructions loud enough to set up a wall at the other end of the field.

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“That’s what I love about him,” senior back Salvatore Borea said during preseason. “It’s good to have him back there, it’s a good safety — you can look back and be like, ‘He’s there, he can take care of his own area.’”

Occasionally, Leland’s fiery spirit gets the best of him, like the yellow card for talking to the referee a little too pointedly in the team’s home-opener. He’s working on it.

“His competitiveness ... your strength can sometimes become your weakness and in that case it did,” Cormier said. “That’s exactly what it is. He’s the ultimate competitor.

“I find him to be pretty authentic and refreshing,” Cormier said. “Working with him is pretty refreshing and I get a kick out of him.”

Leland said he’s starting to feel the toll of his craft. His elbows are starting to crack when he bends them, the product of falling back to the turf after countless dives to the corners. But he has yet to tire of his winding path from Richmond to Burlington.

Perhaps there’s another goal to keep after UVM. Maybe the road takes a different turn.

“Soccer, it’s all over the world, and goalkeeping is such a unique skill to know. Even if it doesn’t work out (playing) for me, maybe I can become a coach and produce something in someone else,” Leland said. “That would ultimately be a nice feeling.”